With Perfect Clarity

By Jamie Ferguson

Emma remembers her death with perfect clarity. Brutally murdered in Colorado in the late 1800s, she haunts the house of her death, unable to leave its walls even after the building burns down. In present day 2003, a video store occupies the original site. Emma spends her days watching movies and the living until she meets Ashley, a ghost who remembers nothing about her own recent death. To help Ashley, Emma must relive her own long-ago murder, which she discovers she does not remember with perfect clarity after all.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Blackbird Publishing
• Release date: Apr 26, 2013
• ISBN: 9781939949035

Book preview

WITH PERFECT CLARITY

By Jamie Ferguson

Copyright © 2013 by Jamie Ferguson

With Perfect Clarity is a work of fiction.  Any resemblance to actual events, places, incidents, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Published by Blackbird Publishing, LLC

www.blackbirdpublishing.com

Cover design: Andrew Brozyna, www.ajbdesign.com

Cover images: Shutterstock, PunchStock, Library of Congress

ISBN-13: 978-1-939949-03-5

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For Harry and Lulu.

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Table of Contents

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

About the Author

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One

Being dead is like watching an endless movie — forever observing, but never participating. Sometimes it makes me want to scream — sometimes I do scream. It doesn’t matter whether I do or not. No one can hear me anyway.

There’s a real movie — a ghost story — playing on the television set at the front of the store. I’ve seen it a thousand times. The ghost moves furniture, makes noises, and eventually manages to communicate with the living. But it’s just a movie — none of those things actually work. I’ve tried, over and over and over.

I wrinkle my nose at the screen as I walk by.

My footsteps slow as I pass the end of the row of Action and Adventure DVDs, trailing my fingertips along the wall as I trace the boundaries of my home, my prison, my world. I reach the window and pause, looking out through where my reflection should be, and watch the rain patter on the pavement in front of the store. I miss the chill of raindrops flung against my face by the autumn winds, their refreshing coolness in the sweltering heat of the summer. I wrap my arms around myself, squeezing so tight it hurts. I feel real, but if I were outside the rain would fall right through me.

It’s been a dreary November day — the rain steady, the kind you can walk through quickly without a coat, but if you stay outside too long you’ll be soaked to the skin. It’s been raining like this since early morning, around three o’clock, or maybe four? Now it’s late afternoon; the sky is almost black, and the streetlights thrust harsh, bright beams through the gloom, everything that’s not illuminated made darker in comparison.

A couple passing by stops underneath the oak tree in front of my window, the branches that shaded the store in the summertime now naked and forlorn without their leaves. They’re arguing about something and are both quite animated. The man makes sweeping gestures with his hands, and the woman crosses her arms and taps her right foot. Her high-heeled shoes are pink and have very pointy toes. Very wet pointy toes, now, as she’s standing in a small puddle. I press my nose flat against the glass and wonder what they’re saying. The woman spins around, little streams of water spraying out from the ends of her hair, and marches down the street. Her companion grimaces, then rushes after her.

I step back from the window, my voyeurism unsatisfied by the brief drama, and start walking along the east wall, then jump to the side as a teenage girl plows around the corner in front of me. Her chestnut hair is glossy in the fluorescent light, and her pale face is blank, almost solemn. Her blouse is made from a bright, flowery fabric that seems far too happy for her to wear, and her jeans are a few shades darker than my own. She stomps past me, her footsteps firm. Her eyes slide over me, unseeing. I turn my head and watch her march on by, then I continue on, my own feet soundless as always.

I make my way over to the dark red sofa and plop down, the tangibility of the cushions inflexible against my nonexistent body. If I chose to I could slide right through the sofa instead of rest on top of it. Yet another inexplicable conundrum of being a ghost, like when I feel my heart thump away when I see Matt, even though my physical heart is long gone, rotted in the ground somewhere with the rest of my body. It bothers me to move through things even though I know I’m not real, not in the manner that I used to be, at least. There’s something disturbing about seeing yourself inside something else, even if it makes sense. As much sense as possible, that is. I place my feet on the cushion and stare up at the ceiling, remembering how fresh and bright it looked the last time it was painted. Now, in 2003, it’s worn, tired, the paint dirty and peeling a bit in the corners, just like the rest of the building. Just like me.

I’ve been trapped here for more than a century, unable to leave, unsure if I’ll ever be able to. Things have changed, of course. The original house — his house — is gone, burned to the ground twenty–two years after I died. This house, which has since been converted into a video store, was built a few years later on the same spot, but slightly off center. Apparently I am constrained by the boundaries of the house in which I died, but the new house doesn’t exactly match those boundaries, so I can go a few feet outside the store to the north, but can’t reach the west wall inside.

I remember old stories that told about ghosts needing to accomplish some task before they could move on, so I’ve always supposed I must have something to do, but I can’t seem to determine what it is. I can’t do much in my ethereal state anyway, but I’ve tried everything I can think of, hoping year after year that I’ll figure out whatever it is, hoping that there really is something to be figured out. I’ve attempted to talk to the living, but of course they never hear me. I’ve tried to leave — to escape — but the walls of the old Colorado farmhouse, of my prison, have remained steadfast even though the physical walls turned to ashes long ago. I’ve scoured my memory, going over and over every single thing I can recall from my nineteen years of life, but I haven’t been able to come up with anything I did or didn’t do that would have caused me to be bound here. Revenge or justice seem plausible in the movies, but how can I get revenge or justice when my murderer must be dead himself by now? I can’t tell anyone anything. I can’t leave this place. And I can’t even do half the things ghosts in movies can. So how could I possibly avenge myself?

I squirm around and sit upright, my feet dangling just above the floor. I tug on the hem of my T-shirt so the fabric lies straight. Revenge wouldn’t bring me back to life anyway, so what good would it be? All I want is to move on, to go wherever everyone else goes when they die. I kick my sneakered feet against the sofa, my blows as ineffectual as ever. I sigh and rest my elbow on the arm, propping my head up with my fist. I won’t give up. Someday I’ll figure out what I’m supposed to do. Someday.

Several customers walk by; a short, stout man and his three boys, two of whom are arguing over which movie to rent. I ignore them all, wallowing in my melancholy. The third child ignores them too. He’s playing a portable video game and is completely absorbed. He stops in front of the couch, then sits down on top of me, in me. For a split second I am him —

... I kick ass at Fighters of Doom! Damn ... the batteries are getting low ... I hope Mom doesn’t find out I cheated on my math test ...

I leap up as quickly as I can, but I still feel sullied. Get away from me! I yell. My voice carries across the room, but no one hears me. I bite my lip, stumbling away from the couch where Terry occupies my old spot — Terrence Phillip Jones, but he goes by Terry. He’s in third grade, and he loves peanut butter and banana sandwiches, and —

I’m Emma, not Terry. Emma! I try to shake free of the otherness of his person, his being, even though I know it usually takes a few minutes until I feel like myself again. I shudder and move back to my previous post at the shelf, but even that’s not safe because Terry’s two brothers, who for that brief moment I knew just as well as Terry does —

... Jack and Jerry ... twins, both evil ... they put dog shit in my bed the other night, and gave me a wedgie on the bus last Tuesday ...

— round the corner, arguing full steam. I duck out of their way just in time to avoid being touched again. I hate this! I scratch my head with both hands, raking my scalp with my nails as I try to force the last bits of Terry’s mind out of my own, his thoughts, his memories, his dreams lingering in mine like footsteps in wet grass.

I retreat to the other side of the store and curl up in a little ball on the checkered couch, the comfortable couch, the one I sit on when it’s the middle of the night and I wish with all my might that I could go home. I hear the raindrops from outside, but in my mind the fire crackles in the hearth, warming our little house. Mama puts the kettle on. Papa says to me, in his stern Papa voice, Fetch some more wood, Emma, my lass. Freddie giggles, running the toy train Papa carved for him over the wide pine planks of the floor. Lizzie sits in the rocking chair, head bent over her cross-stitch.

Although they are vivid in my memory, I know those days are gone forever. I smack the soft arm of the sofa with my fist, but my intangibility keeps me from having the satisfaction of feeling the stuffing give.

My home is gone. Even if our house is still there, my family isn’t. My parents, my sister, my brother ... They’re all dead, and have been for years and years and years. I was murdered in 1873, when Lizzie was fifteen, and Freddie was five. Even if they both lived to be a hundred they’ve been dead for a long, long time.

I lay my head on the back of the couch, the mustiness of the fabric familiar, full of my invisible tears.

~~~~~

After a while I drag myself up and wander back to the front window. The woman with the pointed shoes is on the other side of the street, next to the streetlight by the bookstore. She’s without her companion, and appears a bit more bedraggled, but at least she’s managed to find an umbrella. She paces back and forth, making one call after another on her cell phone. I have no idea what’s wrong, but I entertain myself by coming up with stories. Maybe she’s supposed to meet someone who’s late? Maybe the man she was with earlier was her boyfriend, or her husband, and she’s angry with him? Perhaps she just lost her job and she’s angry with her husband? I craft my imaginary scenarios one by one, discarding each when I think of something new.

The store is pretty quiet. Vicki and Stacia are behind the counter — they’re the only ones working right now. Stacia is short and has long, amazingly straight blonde hair. Vicki has dark brown hair and olive-toned skin. I heard her say once that she’s part Italian and part Seminole, which I guess is a kind of Indian. The Indians who lived here when I was alive were mostly Arapaho and Cheyenne, but I’ve never heard mention of Seminole. Vicki and Stacia are both in their early twenties, which technically makes them older than me, although after being dead for a while, age doesn’t seem all that relevant. Would I be different now if I’d been older when I died? Or if I’d been younger?

I ponder this for the millionth time while I watch Vicki ring up a customer. She’s working here while she gets her nursing degree. Stacia doesn’t think she’s smart enough to go to college, so she’s working here because she doesn’t know what else to do. I know this from listening to them, not from touching them.

There are a few other people in the store — not many, but it should pick up in a bit. I look forward to the busier times. I have to work harder to avoid touching anyone, but having more people around temporarily alleviates the dullness. Edward is here, of course. He’s here just about every day, although he hardly ever rents a movie. He’s in his mid-thirties, or at least I think he is. It’s hard to tell because I’ve never seen him take off his sunglasses, regardless of what time of day it is. He’s a heavyset, unsavory-looking man who rides a Harley and wears leather and chains. He clearly fancies Stacia. He prowls around the store in those heavy leather boots, pretending to look at movies, but I can tell he’s always got one eye on the counter.

There’s also the pale girl I saw earlier. She’s been pacing up and down the aisles for a while. She seems vaguely familiar. I spent most of the morning watching people through the front window, so perhaps I saw her pass by outside. She’s quite pretty, even with that serious look on her face, which makes it odd that Edward hasn’t noticed her, especially since she just walked by him. He’s probably too focused on Stacia. I think he’s figured out her work schedule, because he’s almost always here when she’s working.

I turn back to the window just in time to see the woman across the street get into a car and slam the door; the car speeds away, tires squealing. Yet another snippet of someone else’s life, another mystery for me to wonder about, since I have no life of my own.

I start walking along the wall, trailing my fingers across it. Might as well do my rounds now. Long ago I developed a habit of traversing the boundaries at least once a day. I usually start by tracing them on the ground floor, then the second story. I check out the basement sometimes. I don’t like to go down there, but I make myself just in case a way out miraculously appears. I so hate going down there. I remember every detail of my old prison, even though it doesn’t exist now; the chill of the stone wall underneath my fingers, the earthy scent of the dirt floor, the sound of his feet stomping on the wooden boards above me.

The bells on the front door jingle and I pause, my fingertips still touching the wall. I lean around the shelves and peek over at the counter, hoping that Matt has come in, even though he’s not supposed to be working tonight. It’s not Matt, unfortunately, just a balding, middle-aged man. I sure wish it had been Matt instead. There’s something about him, something irresistibly captivating. I follow him around the store when he’s here, admiring him, watching every move he makes, even when he’s sitting at the counter doing nothing at all. I love listening to his voice, the tones warm and rich and charming no matter what he’s saying. I know it’s ridiculous. He’ll never even be aware of my existence. But I can’t help but feel happy when he’s around, and that’s so unusual that I’ve given myself license to enjoy it.

The pale girl glanced up when the door opened, but now she’s back to pacing the aisles. At least I think that’s what she’s doing. She doesn’t seem to be reading the movie titles; she’s just walking up and down the aisles. She must have gone through them all several times by now. I watch with absent-minded curiosity as she proceeds methodically through the store, row by row, then I move out of her path right before she reaches me.

She stops and looks directly at me, which is, of course, pure coincidence because there’s no way she can see me. Her lashes are long and full, her eyes a golden-brown with little flecks of green; the exact same color Lizzie’s eyes were. Her long hair is lovely, a rich, warm brown with blonde streaks. It’s very pretty, although the blonde bits look a little too evenly spaced to be natural. These days most of the girls color their hair, or else they have something pierced or maybe tattooed. It all seems awfully foolish to me, but apparently this sort of thing is the fashion.

I step to the side, to her left, and her eyes follow me. They can’t, but they do. It’s almost as though she really does see me. I gawk at her for a minute.

Would you please not stare at me like that? she asks.

There’s a loud ringing in my ears, as if I have just been smacked on the head. She’s looking directly at me. There’s no one else here. She has to be looking at me. She’s talking to me.

No one has ever seen me, not once in all these years. Yet clearly she does.

I stare at her, my mouth hanging open.

She makes a small, exasperated sound, rolls her eyes, then spins around and marches off.

My entire body is frozen solid. She saw me. I stand there, thunderstruck, as she turns the corner of the nearest aisle and is gone from my sight.

My feet feel as though they’ve grown roots and will never again be willing to move. No one has seen me — and no one has spoken to me — for the 130 years since my death in 1873. But she did! I sway back and forth slightly, staring at the spot where I last saw her. There’s a strange thumping in my chest, and my entire body is buzzing like the bells of an alarm clock.

I rip my feet from their moorings and rush around the corner after her, filled with a desperate need to find her, to follow her — to be seen by her.

The aisle is empty.

I dash to the end of the aisle, turning frantically from left to right. The girl is nowhere to be seen. Where is she? My heart pounds madly away. I lunge to my left and peer down the next row over, but she’s not there. I run from row to row as fast as I can, my steps so unsteady I have to put out a hand to catch myself as I whip around the end of each shelf to see yet another empty aisle. She saw me! I race